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Moishe Krol

Born: ca. 1912Radom, Poland

Moishe was born to Yiddish-speaking Jewish parents in Radom. The industrial city was known for its armaments factories in which Jews could not work and for its leather industry in which many Jews did. When Moishe was a teenager, he finished school and apprenticed to become a women's tailor. Moishe earned a certificate enabling him to be a licensed tailor and settled down in Radom.

1933-39: By 1939, I had become a master tailor specializing in women's clothes. I remember local antisemitic organizations which displayed anti-Jewish posters and sponsored boycotts of Jewish businesses. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland. Seven days later, German troops entered Radom. Polish antisemitism paled in contrast to the ensuing brutalities.

1940-44: In April 1941 I was forced to live in a ghetto along with all of Radom's Jewish citizens. The Germans assigned me and other master tailors to work in an SS shop in 1942. That August, the Germans liquidated Radom's two ghettos and deported thousands of people to the Treblinka extermination camp. Like other skilled artisans, I was selected to remain in the ghetto, working as a forced laborer. But the roundups continued. We forced laborers felt like helpless chickens in a coop, waiting to be yanked away for slaughter.

Two years later, Moishe was deported to labor camps in Germany. He was liberated by American troops during a forced march near Dachau. After the war, he emigrated to the U.S.